


A New Kind Of Romance

by zebtrestalala



Category: Homestuck
Genre: F/M, Shitty Detective Story I Guess, Speciesswap
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2012-01-13
Updated: 2012-01-13
Packaged: 2017-10-29 11:07:08
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,149
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/319216
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/zebtrestalala/pseuds/zebtrestalala
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"I'm not even qualified for this job, what the hell was that asshole thinking?"</p><p>"Not qualified? What about all those forensics classes you took with me in college? What about all those stories you uncovered for the Times?"</p><p>"Teresa, I write a romantic advice column."</p><p>"So? Maybe you should dabble in a new kind of romance?"</p><p>"What the fuck are you talking about?"</p><p>"The adventure kind, stupid."</p><p>Trolls/Humans Swap, Murder Mystery Ensues.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. The Beginning of Something Stupid

“And with that, Karkat Vantas flew off into the pitch-black darkness of the veil, accompanied only by a select few of his unfortunately handicapped acquaintances. The sole bastion of sanity in this den of lunatics and murderers, Karkat had three years to sift through the romantic detritus left behind by the catastrophic actions of his friends, but with the lovely Terezi Pyrope by his side, he knew that he would have no probl-”

“Oh my god, what's that?!”

Karl looked up from his computer with a jolt, whipping around to see that someone had walked in on him writing shitty romantic prose yet again. Thankfully it was the same person who had always caught him on these sort of romantic escapades, but at the same time it wasn't really reassuring at all.

“Naomi. How the everloving fuck do you keep doing that?!” he growled.

“Haha, I can't tell you my secrets, kitten! The huntress nefurr gives away her secrets,” she almost purred as she slinked around to Karl's side, leaning on his shoulder. Her little cat earrings dangled obnoxiously close to Karl's face, and her “purr”-fume assaulted his nostrils, making him light headed as if the scent itself had kicked him in the back of the head.

“I swear to god you must have some sort of sixth sense for the worst times to walk in on people doing anything,” he muttered, trying to wrap himself around the computer screen to prevent her from sneaking a peak. “Is there anything you wanted other than to have more embaressing blackmail against me?”

“Of course there is, silly,” she giggled, something that would have seemed odd from a 26-year old woman if not for her youthful features. Naomi could easily pass for someone much younger than her, in their mid-teens at least. Which was why Karl always felt a little dirty when she tried to dress provocatively. Especially since he knew it was intended for him. “I came to see if you had come up with a new column yet! The deadline's in an hour, you know.”

“Of course I came out with a new column, there's never an end to the romantic atrocities that people commit on a day to day basis. How about you? Come with any divine alignments for the next major celeb fling yet? Have Brittney and Lady Gaga hooked up yet?”

“Ew, Karl, you know I'm not into that sort of thing!” she cried. “I was just going to comment on Beyonce and Jay-Z and how they're a beeeeautiful couple!”

The way her eyes seemed to sparkle at that comment made his insides curdle. How anyone could actually approach this business with genuine interest and passion was beyond him. It probably involved varying degrees of mild autism.

“Oh god, spare me. You know they're never going to last,” leaving out any sort of comment that could have been racist or insulting to the black journalist. Columnist. Bullshitist. Same deal.

“You know, you really shouldn't work for People magazine if you're going to be so jaded to every relationship the stars get into,” she said, wagging a finger playfully at him.

“I do it because I loathe myself more than I loathe J-Lo and Halle Berry, Naomi. I consider this a just purgatory for whatever atrocity I must have committed in my previous life.”

“You mean, as Karvat Kantas, the most esteemed romantic counselor on the alien planet Ternzia? Courter to the lovely Teresa, I mean, Terezi?” she said with a giggle.

“Oh my god, you did read it. You bitch. And it's Karkat, not Karvat.”

“Whatever! I just find it really amusing that you have to express all your sexual tension with Teresa in the form of a sci-fi romance novel!”

“THAT IS NONE OF YOUR FUCKING CONCERN,” he shouted, far above the accepted noise level of the office they worked in. His face immediately got beet red, and for a few seconds both him and Naomi cowered in a silence so awkward and tense you could cut it with a knife.

“If it helps,” she whispered. “I've done the same thing with some of my exes, too. I was Nep-”

“I think now would be a good time for you to leave,” Karl hissed. “Or this stapler might wind up conveniently lodged where the sun doesn't shine.”

****

After Karl had wrote his third and final romantic advice for the issue, and after he submitted his snarky and unexpected column analyzing the merits of longstanding star relationships using Branjelina as a case study, he had about thirty minutes to kill before he could go home for the evening. He probably should have worked on the next issue, maybe even set up an interview with one of Hollywood's stars, or some New York hotshot if wanted it a bit closer to home. But after dealing with Naomi earlier, his tolerance for bullshit had taken a staggering blow, and now all he wanted to do was stare at funny videos of cats set to the tune of the Fresh Prince of Bel Air theme song until his brain went numb.

As he was clicking on video number four, his phone went off. He wish he could have set his office phone, like his cell phone, to the theme song as well, if only to make it less of a pain in the ass to pick up. Bracing himself for some vapid “hot tip” from a tabloid crazed soccer mom or for one of the guys a few desks over to ask him to bring him more paper, he picked it up.

“Karl Ventris, People magazine. How can I help you?”

“Uh, hi, Mr. Ventris. I was wondering, if, uh, you could help me?”

“Look, man, just write it in an email. I don't give advice to every asshole who finds out my office phone.”

“Uh, no, Mr. Ventris, that's, uh, not it. I was wondering if you could, um, help me with my girlfriend.”

“I already told you. Write me an email. Is that really so hard to understand? Oh, and right off the bat, have you tried Viagra?”

“It's not that, Mr. Ventris. She's been murdered.”

Oh, fuck.


	2. In Which Karl Makes Decisions He May Regret

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Karl Ventris gets a job he wasn't expecting.

“And the first thing you thought of was to call me?” Karl hissed, putting as much venom and rage into his voice. “Were you dropped on your head? Call the police, you ignorant fuckstain! I don't want, I dson't need tio hear that your girlfriend's been...murdered” he said, his voice dropping into an unintelligible whisper at the last word.

“They won't help me, Mr. Ventris, please! I need you,” said the other man, sobbing into the receiver.

“No, you need professional help. I'm not a P.I., I'm a journalist. I give people advice for their-”

“Romantic problems, I know, I read your column every single issue. I've read every article you'vre written. I know that you're smart, Mr. Ventris. You notice things. You can analyze.”

“Yeah, and I do that for a living. For a magazine. Not for stupid, brainwashed, tabloid chewing schmucks who think I'm goddamned Phillip Marlowe or something! If you're that desperate, contact a real P.I.”

“I don't think those even exist anymore, Mr. Ventris. They're just fakey fake stories, like fairy tales.”

“Are you FUCKING serious. I don't- I can't- Fine. We can meet. But only because talking to you on the phone is one of the most irritating things I've had the displeasure of doing in the past three years. I get off work in 20 minutes. Can you meet me at the Deli on the corner by the office?”

“Uh, I think so, Mr. Ventris. Thank you, you don't know how much-”

With that, Karl hung up the phone, and held his head in his hands. As he ground his eye sockets with his palms in frustration, he realized what a monumentally terrible decision this was. He didn't even know the name of the person who had requested him as a makeshift P.I., and had no way of knowing if it wasn't just some rabid fan with a knife who was pissed off for him bashing Katy Perry. Knowing his luck, it probably was. He considered telling someone, Naomi, his boss, that douchebag who worked one desk over from him, anyone so that when he inevitably went missing and his body wound up in a sewer in Queens people might actually try to find out who killed him. But he knew he wouldn't. He would get that stare that he always got, the 'I-can't-believe-you-found-something-else-to-complain-about' stare and would promptly be ignored. Or he would summon up some sort of inane, childish shriek of a laugh, if he told Naomi, who would proceed to bug him about 'his secret admirer.' No, no good could come of telling anyone in this despicable pit of inanity.

With 5 minutes left to go on the clock and his cat videos exhausted, Karl began to pack up his things, making sure to lump all of the heavy shit, such as his coffee mug, stapler, and hole punch in one side of his briefcase, and subtly slipped his pocket knife into his right pocket. A guy like him should never be one to start fights, yet out of paranoid delusion that the world was full of idiots who wanted him dead, he still prepared for such occassions.

With an unusually brisk pace to his stepped, Karl clocked out and marched off to meet his inevitable doom.

****

When he entered the cafe, however, he soon figured out that of all the people in New York, this man had to be one of the least threatening ones there could be. Though he was seated, Karl could tell that he was probably a bit taller than his 5'7”, but the way he slouched over in his chair and kept nervously glancing at the doorway told him that this man prbably wouldn't fight back even if someone had punched him square in the jaw. He probably had gotten punched in the jaw a few times, judging by a few bruises on his face and a slightly weary look behind all the nervousness.

“Hey,” said Karl, walking over to his table. “Are you the asshole who called me in the office?”

“Oh, Mr. Ventris, I didn't see you come in. Yes, that would, um, be me. I'm Ross Martin. I'm so glad you could-”

“Look, man, I don't know why the hell you decided to contact me rather than the police, but I am not your solution to this problem,” Karl butted in, quick to assert himself against the weaker willed man.

“I can't go to the police, Mr. Ventris, I told you. It looks like a suicide.”

“Well, what makes it _not_ suicide to you? Maybe your girlfriend just hit some hard times and couldn't take it anymore.”

“You don't understand, Mr. Ventris,” he said, waving his arms. “She had no reason to commit suicide! She never, ever quit, she never said no! And, um, she seemed pretty nervous, the, er, day before. She said she would have to take it on the, um, downlow for a little while.”

“I still don't see why you couldn't tell the police this. Or a P.I. Which, for the record, are completely legit and are not fake. You really think in a society where guys cheat on their wives all the time that there wouldn't be any industry in finding that shit out?”

“My girlfriend, she wasn't...exactly...in the best standing with the law,” Ross said, his eyes darting down to his shoes.

“So let me get this straight. You called a romance columnist to do the dirty work for you because your girlfriend's a crook. And the police won't get involved. And for some reason you didn't hire one of the people who actually make their living doing this shit because you're probably dirt cheap, and you think that flattering me by saying you're my biggest fan or something will make me want to endanger myself and my career to figure out who killed your girlfriend!” Karl said, his voice rising as he went along.

“Um, yes, except that I really didn't know that P.I.s were a thing anymore.”

“You're a moron and you're convincing me less and less that I should help you by the second. Who was your girlfriend, anyway?”

“Her name was Veronica Sanders,” he whispered, eying the people around them suspiciously. “You might have heard of her.”

Karl had indeed heard of her, she was one of those names that had recently kept creeping up over the news like particularly persistent spider. He didn't know much about her, but he did know that she had not been portrayed as a Samaritan.

“Yeah,” he said, his mind wondering. He was at a crossroads, now. He could turn this poor schmuck to the street right here and now, say he didn't want the name of Veronica Sanders creeping up on his resume, and tell him to get lost and find somebody with less standards them him. But at the same time, however delusional and overly optimistic Ross Martin may have been by coming to him, he still had come to him. Not any other journalist in the city. Which left one more thing nagging in his mind.

“How much would you be willing to pay?”

“I...um, I don't really, that is...I don't have that much money. I run a pet store in the city, you see. Veronica had all the money, and well,” his voice dropped down low again, “it wasn't exactly clean.”

“Forget it, Martin. If you can't even make up for my medical bill, I'm not taking the job.”

“But-”

“I'm not taking it, you fucking idiot! Now stop bothering me!” Karl shouted, turning quite a few of the Deli customers' heads, before storming out of the cafe into the cool March air.

****

“And so then I told him that I wasn't going to fucking take it. Can you believe it? This kid comes up to me in the middle of my work day crying about how his girlfriend's dead and how I'm the only one who can help him and he doesn't even have the money to dish out! God, some people in this world are real dumbasses, Ter.”

Even though he was on the phone, Karl couldn't help but gesture wildly with his hands while retelling his story of the day. Teresa Piraino may have been his ex, but for god knows why she still listened to him when he called, and even had the courtesy to get a lunch with him, once a month. Karl had a limited number of understanding friends, and luckily Teresa was usually available when he needed to bitch.

“I don't get why he didn't just call up your people and handle it there. I mean, sure, his girlfriend's bad news but it's not like a pet shop owner is going to get in trouble for dating the wrong chick, as long as he didn't do anything retarded.”

“First off, I'm a lawyer, not a cop, Karl. And second off, why not take the case?”

“Were you listening to anything I just goddamn told you? Ross Martin is a nutcase and nervous wreck. I might see if I can get him referred to a shrink. For all I know that motherfucker killed Sanders himself.”

“I heard you the first time, moron. Martin obviously saw something in you when he came to you for the job, why not give it a shot? I think you'd like it.”

"I'm not even qualified for this job, what the hell was that asshole thinking?"

"Not qualified? What about all those forensics classes you took with me in college? What about all those stories you uncovered for the Times?"

"Teresa, I write a romantic advice column."

"So? Maybe you should dabble in a new kind of romance?”

"What the fuck are you talking about?"

"The adventure kind, stupid."

“Like Sir Lancelot and shit? No thanks, running around with swords isn't exactly my thing Teresa. Thanks for your overwhelming concern for me and my condition.”

“Screw you and screw your condition. Think of it like you're one of those home-grown detectives you read about in all those novels. Like a Dick Francis character, or maybe Miss Marple. Come on, Karlito, give it a chance.”

“Yes, 'Resa, I'm a fucking Agatha Christie character. Let's get real here. I'm content writing advice for shithead who couldn't schmooze their way out of a paper bag.”

“That's a load of bullshit if I've ever heard it. If we're getting real here, you should admit that you've _always_ dreamed of being able to do something like this.”

It was true. He had. Even though he could never be a police officer or a detective, could never walk the mean streets and toe the line with death, he had always been fascinated by tales of adventure almost as much as he had been fascinated by shitty romantic comedies. Starting with tales of knight errants running through the fields of Camelot and cultivating into thrillers, mysteries, and war novels, his love of adventure had led to him trying at first to pursue some sort of criminal justice degree, before being convinced that journalism was more his route.

Part of Karl was itching to take on that case, while another part was trying to beat him senseless for thinking he could tackle something this huge and come away alive.

“Okay,” he said at last. “I think I might take the case. But under one condition: You're going to help me out.”

“It's a deal,” she said with an almost sinister delight from the other end. “Call me, beep me, when you want to reach me.”

“Give me a while. I need to go beat myself senseless for this stupid decision before I go anywhere,” Karl said with a sigh, and hung up the phone. He needed to call Ross back, and tell him that he was going to entertain his stupid problem anyway, and then he needed to figure out where the hell someone starts with a murder mystery.

If he was lucky, he might be able to keep his head screwed on the right way and all his limbs attached through this. But somehow he didn't think he'd be that lucky.

###### Notes

  
Uh, yeah so Karl finally gets his murder mystery. Sorry if it's running a bit slow. Are the chapters long enough for y'all? I don't want to lay too much down at one time but I also want to try and tell a good story. I just want to go ahead and say that this is mostly character based, not much emphasis on locations and all, seeing as I don't live in New York, it just fit as a good city to base it in. 


End file.
